The 50 nominees span New Jersey history, from early American writer James Fenimore Cooper to Dorothea Dix, the champion for the mentally ill to Pulitzer-winning novelist Junot Diaz.

The public can vote for one nominee in each of five categories here through June 7. There is no permanent New Jersey Hall of Fame, but there is a mobile museum designed by Princeton architect Michael Graves.

James Fenimore Cooper, theBurlington-born author of "The Last of the Mohicans"; Gaetano Federici, the late Paterson sculptor; George Theophilus Walker, the first African-American composer to win the Pulitzer Prize for music and a longtime Montclair resident; Junot Diaz, the author of the Paterson-set "The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao" who grew up in Old Bridge; John McPhee, the New Yorker writer and Princeton professor; William T. Scheide, the late Princeton resident, musicologist and philanthropist; George Prince, the late New Yorker cartoonist and longtime Tenafly resident; Edmund Wilson, the essayist and literary critic who was born in Red Bank; Fran Lebowitz, the humorist and style icon who was born and raised in Morristown; and Anna Quindlen, the novelist and Pulitzer-winning former New York Times columnist who grew up in South Brunswick.

Doris Duke, the late tobacco heiress who developed the public display gardens in Hillsborough; Samuel Leeds Allen, who invented the Flexible Flyer sled in the late 1800s in Cinnaminson; Freeman John Dyson, the theoretical physicist who joined the faculty at Princeton's Institute for Advanced Study in 1953 and who has made his home in Princeton since; William Fox, an early film producer and theater owner who was part of Fort Lee's heyday as the original Hollywood in the early 1900s; Bruce S. Gordon, the Camden-born business executive who also served as president of the NAACP; Lewis Katz, a Camden native who once owned the Nets and Devils and who had just emerged the victor in his fight to own the Philadelphia Inquirer owner when died in plane crash in New Jersey last year; Bernard Marcus, the Newark native who co-founded The Hope Depot; Victor Parsonnet, the Newark-raised cardiac surgeon and a longtime chairman of the New Jersey Symphony Orchestra; John A. Roebling, the Prussian-born engineer and bridge builder who founded a wire rope factory in Trenton and later built the company town of Roebling; Sara Spencer Washington, the early beauty magnate who founded her first salon in Atlantic City and who became one of the country's first female African-American millionaires.

Performance arts

The Isley Brothers, the Teaneck-based R&B singers; Kool & the Gang, the R&B and funk group founded in Jersey City as the Jazziacs; Ernie Kovacs, late Trenton-born comedian and actor who got it starts in local theater and radio and who died in a car crash in 1962; Nathan Lane, the Tony-winning Broadway actor who was born and raised in Jersey City; comedian Eddie Murphy, who made Englewood's Bubble Hill his home for many years; Joe Pesci, the Newark-born actor best known for "Goodfellas" and "My Cousin Vinny"; Nelson Riddle, the late arranger and bandleader who famously worked with Frank Sinatra and who grew up in Oradell and Ridgewood; Jon Stewart, "The Daily Show" host who grew up in Lawrenceville; Flip Wilson, the late Jersey City-born comedian and variety show host; and Teresa Wright, the late Oscar-winning actress who starred in "Mrs. Miniver" who was raised in Maplewood.

Public service

John Rock, the first African-American lawyer admitted to the U.S. Supreme Court bar. Star-Ledger file

William Neal Brown, the late longtime Rutgers social work professor and former Tuskegee Airman who lived in Milburn; Robert Lee Carter, who was raised in Newark and East Orange, worked as the legal counsel for the NAACP after Thurgood Marshall and who spent 40 years as a U.S. District Court judge; James H. Coleman Jr., the first African-American justice on the New Jersey Supreme Court who now practices in Morristown; Dorothea Dix, an early activist for the rights of the insane who founded New Jersey's first state hospital for the mentally ill in Trenton; Carla Harris, a senior Wall Street executive, author and accomplished singer who lives Montclair; Thelma Conley-Hurd, the late longtime Elizabeth educator; Jack H. Jacobs, the Woodbridge-raised Medal of Honor recipient for his actions in Vietnam who works as a military analyst for NBC and lives in Far Hills; Frank Lautenberg, the late U.S. Senator who was born in Paterson; John Rock, the Salem-born abolitionist and lawyer who became the first African-American admitted to the bar of the U.S. Supreme Court; and Irene Hill Smith, the late Mullica Hill-born civil rights activist who served as national vice president of the NAACP.

Sports

New York Yankees shortstop Derek Jeter tips his cap to the crowd during a retirement celebration ceremony last year. William Perlman | NJ Advance Media

James J. Braddock, the celebrated boxer and "Pride of New Jersey," who grew up in West New York and died in North Bergen in 1974; Dick Button, the former Olympic figure skater and longtime sports analyst who was born and raised in Englewood; Stanley Dancer, the late harness racer and the only horseman to drive and train three Triple Crowns who raised in New Egypt and lived there most of his life; Leon Allen "Goose" Goslin, the Baseball Hall of Famer from the 1920s and 1930s who was born in Salem; Roosevelt "Rosey" Grier, the former NFL star and television personality who played high school football in Roselle; Derek Jeter, the New York Yankees legend who spent his early years in Pequannock Township; Sharon Pfluger, the winningest NCAA coach who leads the College of New Jersey's women's field hockey and lacrosse teams who was raised in Pompton Lakes and lives in Hopewell Township; Bill Raftery, a Kearny high school basketball star who coached the Seton Hall Pirates and works as a broadcaster; Christie Rampone, the Point Pleasant-raised three-sport high school and college athlete who is now captain of the U.S. women's national soccer team; and Dick Vitale, the Passaic-born basketball coach who became a broadcasting legend, first on the fledgling ESPN and later with ABC.